So I Wait for You like a Lonely House
by Luna Darkside
Summary: Kudou Shinichi returns. His memory does not. /ShinKai & KaiShin, amnesia!Shinichi, oneshot, complete/


_I got a guest review a while ago that told me to "try writing something other than romance" and "go beyond the romance genre." I've been thinking about that for all this time... and came to the conclusion that I should write angst. Somehow. I dunno, it seemed like a good idea at the time?_

 _So then I wrote this, which turned out to be a melodramatic mess and also_ still romance _, but, uh, yeah. Hopefully it's a departure from my usual style? (Although there's still a sappy ending, because I am physically incapable writing of sad/open ends. It's a problem, I know.)_

 _Warnings include shounen-ai, grammar mistakes / errors, a lot of weird stylistic shit that I am now regretting, attempted angst, etc. Yeah. Good luck with this one._

 _Hope you, er, enjoy. - Luna_

* * *

 ** _so I wait for you like a lonely house_** _  
till you will see me again and live in me.  
Till then my windows ache._

– Pablo Neruda, _Sonnet LXV_

The first thing he is aware of is the eyes.

Well. That is not entirely true. He is aware of the ringing in his ears, almost describable as the fading echo of a scream, and he is also aware of the lighting in the room, something artificial and fluorescent and hot.

But those things do not remain at the forefront of his mind for long, because he catches sight of the eyes. They are not like any he has ever seen, not dull or bright, not sad or happy, not cold or warm. They are indescribable in the way that they seem both carefree and concerned, and the exact hue is hard to place on the color spectrum, too purple to be cyan yet too blue to be violet.

The eyes belong to a good-looking, messy-haired man who, along with several other people, is crowded around him, enclosing the bed he is lying on. The bed is low, the sheets are white, and the people are expectant as they gaze at him.

He looks from face to face, from the glasses of a middle-aged man to the lifted eyebrows of a small blonde girl to the curved lips of a beautiful young lady to the white-toothed of a tan man and finally back to those beautiful eyes, and he opens his mouth and says, "Who are you?"

The eyes cease to look indescribable. They are only horrified now.

* * *

His name, according to the young lady named Mouri Ran, is Kudou Shinichi. It does not feel particularly like his name – it feels no more his than Jun or Kenji or Satoshi – but he nods and agrees, frowning at the heartbroken expression on her face.

The small blonde girl left moments ago, muttering something about side effects and miscalculations as she went. The bespectacled man followed after her. The owner of the eyes has retreated into the kitchen, his back the only thing visible from the bed.

Mouri Ran and the tan man remain at his side, trying to ply him with questions. He does not know what they are expecting, but he can tell he is disappointing them with his answers.

"Age?" This question from Mouri Ran.

"I don't know."

"What's the date?" Accented, from the tan man.

"I do not know."

"What's your birthday?" Mouri Ran again.

"I do not know."

This goes on for a few minutes. He can see that their shoulders are beginning to droop with every passing question, so he finally intervenes, cutting off the tan man's inquiry about where they are.

"I do not remember anything," he informs them. "I do not remember you, and I do not know anything about myself. All I know is my name is Kudou Shinichi and that she is Mouri Ran. I only know because you told me. I apologize," he adds as an afterthought. Not because he is sorry – he does not understand how he could be responsible for not remembering – but because he can see that he has upset both of them, which was not his intention at all.

There is a heavy silence.

A moment later, Mouri Ran clears her throat. "You are Kudou Shinichi," she begins, her voice creaking like old wood, "and you are my childhood friend."

He nods, at a loss. He does not know what to say.

"You're a detective," she continues, scrutinizing his face with too much hope, "you solved tons of cases, before."

That is the first thing that feels right. He now has a reason why his eyes skip around the room, cataloging information and data to be stored for later access.

The tan man cuts in. "I'm Hattori Heiji," he tells him, uneasily smile loitering around the corners of his mouth. "I'm your best friend." He swallows. "We met when you, uh… your body had been shrunken by a criminal organization. You've just gotten your body back. In fact, you just took the antidote."

He stares, disbelieving. Hattori Heiji flinches under his gaze. He can tell he is disconcerting the other man. "I find that hard to believe."

"There are pictures," Hattori Heiji mumbles, looking away. "But anyway. The girl from before – the blonde one – the same thing happened to her. She made the antidote, but we weren't expecting…" He trails off. "Her name is Haibara Ai, although it was originally Miyano Shiho. The man with her is a family friend of yours, Agasa Hiroshi."

When Hattori Heiji does not say more, he is confused. He casts a glance in the direction of the man at the kitchen table, the man with the striking eyes. "And him?" he asks, eyebrows lifting.

Hattori Heiji opens his mouth, pauses, and then closes it again. He gives Mouri Ran an uninterpretable look.

"He's," Mouri Ran starts, stops, and tries again. "He's Kuroba Kaito."

She doesn't offer any more than that, even when he frowns at her, and dismisses Hattori Heiji and herself a few seconds later, leaving him alone with the still stagnant Kuroba Kaito.

A long, long minute of silence passes. He stares down at his hands. They are well-cared for, nails cut short and cuticles pushed back, the slenderness and length of the fingers attesting to some form of musicality. He would guess violin. His wrists are slender, and he has stark tan lines, probably from a watch, on his left one.

He is contemplating the irregular curves of the tan lines when an unfamiliar voice says, "What have you deduced so far?"

Lifting his face in surprise, he finds that Kuroba Kaito has turned and is gazing at him. He is struck by the oddity of the man's eyes once again – they do not look at him with unconcealed pity, as Mouri Ran and Hattori Heiji's did, yet he cannot call them _un_ pitying, somehow. Maybe the pity is not for him.

"I was a violinist," he informs Kuroba Kaito, and then frowns. "I _am_ a violinist." He is not dead yet, no. Even if he feels he is not who they think he is.

"Right you are." Kuroba Kaito pushes some of his hair out of his face and nods. "Anything... anything else?"

Lifting his arm for inspection, he motions at his wrist. "I wear a watch. A large one."

"You're two for two." Kuroba Kaito smiles a little. His words are all chosen with care and hesitance, both qualities that seem to be in direct opposition to his personality. His expression is fond, but his eyes do not match – they are far too turbulent, too storming for that. "It was a modified watch with a little tranquilizer dart in it. You used to try to use it on me."

The thought makes him raise both eyebrows. "For what purpose?" he inquires, unable to keep the curiosity from his voice.

Kuroba Kaito props himself up on his elbows. "Well, it's a bit of a long story. Complicated." He sighs, slanting his head as he regards him with care. There is something new entering his eyes, an emotion closest to dejection.

"What happened to you, Shinichi?" Kuroba Kaito murmurs.

He does not know how to answer that.

* * *

They let him take a shower that night. In the bathroom mirror, he finds that he is of medium height, pale-skinned and dark-haired. His eyes are hazy blue, his mouth is a common shape, and his cheekbones and jawline are straight. His shoulders are of an average broadness, his legs are proportionate to his torso, and he is muscular in the appropriate places. He supposes he is not hideous, but he does not believe he is anything special.

He washes without fanfare and emerges from the bathroom dressed in the shirt and pants that had been left just inside the door. Hattori Heiji and Mouri Ran have long since left, whispering to each other when they think he cannot hear them. Agasa Hiroshi and Haibara Ai are still in the laboratory.

While he was showering, Kuroba Kaito relocated to a chair beside the bed.

At first, he does not know what to make of this and hovers in the doorway, uncertain. When Kuroba Kaito registers his presence and peers at him, he hurries to reclaim his space on the bed.

Up close, Kuroba Kaito is even more beautiful than he had first thought. The cut of his face is elegant, reminiscent of sculpted gods, and his hair is an attractive, deep brown color. His eyes, of course, are stunning. Kuroba Kaito is a work of art.

He does not know why Kuroba Kaito is here. He does not even know who Kuroba Kaito is to him. He cannot comprehend.

"Look," Kuroba Kaito murmurs after a pause, "I didn't mean what I said. Before. It's not – I think I sounded like I was blaming you, and that's not what I meant. I just…" He blows out a breath, one hand running along the back of his neck. "It was going to be – I mean, I was expecting… well…"

"You were expecting me to remember," he finishes when it becomes clear Kuroba Kaito cannot. "Perfectly understandable. I wish the same."

Kuroba Kaito nods. There is relief written in the lines of the strained, difficult smile he offers. "I'm… well, I'll try my best to help you."

He looks at Kuroba Kaito, at the brittleness to his smile and the contradictory emotions warring in his not-blue, not-purple eyes, and thinks, _Am I the one who needs help?_

* * *

According to Mouri Ran, he took her here on a date, and that was when the shrinking ordeal occurred. Therefore, it is an important place for him and it may help him remember something.

He looks around the crowded amusement park and its hundreds of laughing children and longsuffering parents, feeling Mouri Ran and Hattori Heiji's gazes on his back as they wait for some kind of reaction, but he feels nothing. No spark of recognition, no fragment of memory accompanies the scent of greasy food and innumerable mixed perfumes.

When he turns to face Mouri Ran and Hattori Heiji and shake his head, their expressions fall.

"Well," Mouri Ran says after a brief silence, "we might as well enjoy ourselves, right?" She tries to smile, a shaky semblance of happiness, before she steps forward and links her arm through his. He stares down at where her hand rests in the crook of his elbow and sighs.

They have been walking through the park for about twenty minutes, Hattori Heiji trailing after them at a slower pace, when he stops abruptly. Mouri Ran blinks in bewilderment, turning to regard him with worry. "Shinichi? What's wrong?"

He does not speak. Before them looms an impressive, colorful Ferris wheel, one that cuts a regal silhouette against the brilliant blue sky. There is a total of eighteen cars, each painted a different color. A stream of people is queued up to ride it. It should not be any different from the twelve other rides they have passed, but for some reason he cannot stop staring at it. Something twists in his stomach, on the brink of uncomfortable.

"What," he begins as Hattori Heiji and Mouri Ran continue to watch him, expressions edged with horror, "what… have I ever ridden that Ferris wheel?"

Their reaction is unexpected. Hattori Heiji's face relaxes with astounding speed, while Mouri Ran's does the opposite, tightening beyond measure.

Mouri Ran opens her mouth, but Hattori Heiji is the one to reach forward and place a bracing hand on his shoulder. Something in his face is hopeful. "Yeah. Yeah, you have. With Kuroba – d'you remember?"

No. No, he does not, not quite. He cannot refer to the odd feeling in his stomach as _remembering_. He looks away in lieu of a verbal response.

"It was a few months ago, when you were still Conan-kun. He took you here for your birthday, even though you didn't want to. You and he got stuck at the top of the Ferris wheel together – it was some kind of machine malfunction," Mouri Ran elaborates. Her voice sounds distant, muffled to his ears, as he continues to study the curve of the wheel against the sky.

He finds himself staring at a particular car as it reaches the crest of the ride. It is painted a hue of not-blue, not-purple that seems familiar. It reminds him of Kuroba Kaito's eyes.

Though, he decides as he lets Mouri Ran tug on his arm to express a desire to move along, it is not the exact same color, three shades too light.

When they return to the professor's home that night, Kuroba Kaito is waiting in the kitchen. He looks fragile, tired. It is not a good look on him. Mouri Ran briefs him on the day's happenings, describing the ordeal with the Ferris wheel in a low tone. One would have to be blind to miss the way he shatters into a thousand shards upon hearing.

* * *

Hattori Heiji comes to the conclusion that he needs to visit an old crime scene, and so he drags him to an okonomiyaki restaurant in Haido. It is a nice restaurant, with elegant décor and clean tableware. One of the waitresses remembers them and also seems to harbor some kind of affection for Hattori Heiji, judging from the way she flirts with him. Hattori Heiji either does not notice or does not care.

They do a lap around the restaurant. Hattori Heiji points at a corner booth and explains, "There was a politician who got poisoned here. It was his wife who did it. Something about an affair or something? But yeah, we solved the case together. This was one of your favorites. The wife was really creative with the cyanide."

He is aware that Hattori Heiji is eyeing him with anticipation, but he cannot recall any politicians or poisonings. He stares at the beige seat covers, then the wall paintings without speaking.

His silence is telling enough. Hattori Heiji represses a sigh with visible effort before he smiles. "Oh well, I guess. It was worth a try." He walks to another table and slides into the booth, beckoning for him to follow.

The waitress reappears once they are both seated, beaming at an oblivious Hattori Heiji. She takes their order – Hattori Heiji does the ordering, as he does not remember what foods he likes and dislikes – and soon enough they are cooking their okonomiyaki.

He peers at the sizzling, steaming grill as Hattori Heiji talks in the background. His brow furrows. There is the twinkling of a memory playing at the edges of his mind, scooting out of the way whenever he reaches for it. It has to have something to do with okonomiyaki, he assumes, but the memory refuses to solidify.

"Excuse me," he interrupts, Hattori Heiji's monologue on Osaka's okonomiyaki petering out, "have I come to this restaurant before?"

Hattori Heiji frowns. "You don't mean the time that we solved the murder, right?" When he nods, Hattori Heiji shrugs. "I don't know, but I mean, maybe you –" He cuts himself off, blinking. "Oh – I think you… I think came here with Kuroba, once. But, I mean…"

He does not mind that Hattori Heiji does not know how to proceed, because with that information, the memory allows itself to be caught.

 _"_ _That's a pretty big piece for a six-year-old, tantei-kun. Maybe you should cut back."_

 _"_ _What are you trying to say, asshole?"_

 _"_ _What language! How scandalous!"_

 _"_ _Out of the two of us, you're the wanted criminal. I'd think you're the last person to be scandalized by 'language.'"_

 _"_ _Oh, tantei-kun, you don't know how you wound my delicate sensibilities. How could you call me a criminal?"_

The memory unspools in his mind like a skein of yarn, fuzzy and nebulous. It is not clear; he does not remember what he was wearing, or what Kuroba Kaito was wearing, or what day it was or what he put in the okonomiyaki, but he sees Kuroba Kaito's not-blue, not-purple eyes smiling at him through the haze of steam, hears Kuroba Kaito's arch, teasing tone as he demonstrates his wit, _remembers_ Kuroba Kaito, with astounding clarity.

Even so, he does not understand why he remembers this. The murder seems more memorable than eating with a friend. It defies logic that he should recall this.

When he explains his confusion to Hattori Heiji, Hattori Heiji does not even look surprised. He just looks sad.

Kuroba Kaito looks the same when Hattori Heiji pulls him aside and informs him of what happened, once they return to Agasa Hiroshi's house.

He is starting to hate seeing how Kuroba Kaito's face looks when his heart collapses.

* * *

Haibara Ai and Agasa Hiroshi leave the laboratory and introduce themselves to him a day later. Haibara Ai exudes ice and Agasa Hiroshi radiates good nature. Neither of them seem hopeful of his recovery. He cannot find it in himself to blame them.

As has become habit, Kuroba Kaito is seated at the kitchen table. He watches the proceedings without moving as Haibara Ai does a full-body check with Agasa Hiroshi takes notes. His expression does not change throughout the whole experience. There is a slight downward curve to his mouth.

Kuroba Kaito is still a mystery. Why would he watch this when it is taking him apart piece by piece?

When he has been deemed healthy enough, Haibara Ai takes a few steps back to lock gazes with him. Her eyes are too old for her face, too mature.

"Well, you're fine. In body, at least," she says without any particular inflection. "I suppose it's just psychogenic amnesia. We could probably classify it as a dissociative fugue." She slants her head to one side. "Although that's supposedly caused by psychological trauma… So we were right. It was a combination of the stress from taking the antidote and the fight with Kuroba-kun –"

Before she has finished speaking, Kuroba Kaito is already hushing her. "Haibara, please, he doesn't…"

Haibara Ai blinks, the motion slow as she turns to stare at Kuroba Kaito. "You haven't told him?" she accuses. Behind her, Agasa Hiroshi tries to melt into the background and succeeds.

Kuroba Kaito deflates. His shoulders slump far, far down. "No," he admits.

"What does he think you are to him, then?" Haibara Ai demands, incredulous.

It is in that moment that Kuroba Kaito makes eye contact with him. He looks guilty and tired and crestfallen all at once.

"I don't know," Kuroba Kaito says, voice tiny.

It is a good question, he thinks as he examines the scene before him. He does not know the answer either. It is simple and easy to categorize everyone he has been reacquainted with thus far – Mouri Ran is his childhood sweetheart, Hattori Heiji is his best friend, Haibara Ai is his equal, Agasa Hiroshi is his family friend. Kuroba Kaito is a category of his own, hovering between "friend" and "something else." The "something else" is impossible to define.

"I don't know either," he agrees. All three of them turn to gaze at him. He does not react, not even when he notices the shaking of Kuroba Kaito's bottom lip.

A minute comes and goes. Haibara Ai is the first to break the silence, doing so with a heavy sigh. "All right," she mutters and shakes her head. She casts Kuroba Kaito one more pointed look, comments, "You need to get yourself together, Kuroba-kun," and then motions at him. "Get up," she commands, and he does as she says and gets out of bed. "We're going to visit your house. Maybe that'll help."

They leave Kuroba Kaito and Agasa Hiroshi behind the click of the front door closing.

His house is located across the street. Haibara Ai leads him through the gate without an excess of talking. She unlocks the door in a practiced motion and gestures him in.

The house is cool and dim. Dust gathers on the stairs and the furniture, dancing free of the carpet underfoot as Haibara Ai makes her way down the hall with purpose. He trails after her, unsure of where they are going.

They stop outside an impressive oak door, paneling cut sharp and at right angles. She pushes it open and beckons him forward, as the door swings open without a sound.

It is a library. There are books everywhere, lining the floor-to-ceiling bookshelves and on the heavy desk in one corner. Two armchairs sit in the center of it all. The coffee table settled between them is covered in volumes of varying size and color.

"This is your family library," Haibara Ai informs him from the doorway. "You used to spend a lot of time here."

He walks forward, in a trance. Yes, this place feels like home, a place he has sought for solace in his darkest hours. He does not doubt that he has spent much time here. He exhales, letting the feeling sink in. It is strangely comforting.

The gold lettering on one of the books stacked on the coffee table catches his attention. _Arsène Lupin vs. Herlock Sholmes_. He slants his head at it. There is a memory he associates with this book, a moment he experienced –

"Kuroba Kaito likes this book."

He does not realize he has spoken until Haibara Ai gasps. Turning, he finds her covering her mouth with one hand.

"I remember," he clarifies, tracing the letters with a finger. The book cover is painted not-blue, not-purple, a bit too dark to be the same color as Kuroba Kaito's eyes. He is starting to think that no color matches Kuroba Kaito's eyes. "We had an argument over this book, before. He is a fan of Arsène Lupin, and I am a fan of Sherlock Holmes, though the name was changed for this book. Legal reasons, I believe. He claims that the story is similar to our relationship, though I fail to see how." He glances around the library. "That is all I recall. This place, however, does feel somewhat familiar. I do not understand why it is Kuroba Kaito I remember most clearly."

As he spoke, Haibara Ai's face began to shutter. Now it is fully closed as she shakes her head at him.

"Oh, Kudou-kun," she breathes, and for some reason, it is the saddest sound he has ever heard.

Then again, the inhale Kuroba Kaito gives when Haibara Ai tells him of what occurred in the library is a close second.

* * *

He is exiting the bathroom, ready to sleep, when he hears the sound of something breaking and Kuroba Kaito shouting, "I can't do this."

That in and of itself is alarming; for all of Kuroba Kaito's pain and anguish, he has never raised his voice. He creeps toward the source of the sound, which is in the room he recognizes as Haibara Ai's. The door is ajar, spilling light into the darkened hallway. He positions himself against one side of the doorframe.

Inside, Kuroba Kaito is still speaking. His voice is loud and brash in the relative quiet. "Do you know what this is like?" he is saying as a female voice – Mouri Ran's – attempts to calm him. "All he remembers is _me_. Things he did with me. Places he went with me. Things he talked about with me. But he doesn't remember _me_. He doesn't remember who I _am_ , or what we were – we were so close, you know. I was going to wait until he got his body back, you know?"

"We know, Kuroba-kun." Mouri Ran is soothing, but not enough. Kuroba Kaito surges on, the words spilling from his lips in half-sentences and phrases.

"And then – when Haibara told him there was a chance he wasn't going to survive if he took the antidote, you know, he came to me and he told me and I said he _shouldn't take it_ , not if he could _die_ from it, because even if I couldn't be with – I'd sacrifice so much to see him _safe_ , dammit –"

"It's okay, Kuroba-kun."

Kuroba Kaito is not deterred. His voice rises in volume. "But it's _not_ okay, because we got into that _fight_ over it because he was willing to risk it, risk his _life_ just so he could get his body back, which is _ridiculous_ – and then – and then the antidote worked and I thought it was going to be okay, we could work it out, but… but…"

"Shhh, Kuroba-kun, take a deep breath –"

"It's my fault," Kuroba Kaito says, and he sounds as if he is on the verge of tears. "If it hadn't been for that fight we had, he'd still have – he'd still have his memory, because then he wouldn't have gone through that 'psychological trauma' or whatever Haibara said about it, and this is my entire _fault_."

Mouri Ran gasps. "No one is blaming you for this, Kuroba-kun –"

"So I guess it's my punishment," Kuroba Kaito nearly sobs, his voice breaking as it lowers to a whisper. "I'm responsible for his amnesia, so that's why I have to sit back and watch him remember everything we did together without feeling anything for me. He's – I'm the only thing he remembers, but he doesn't remember what he _felt_ for me." He drags in a shaking breath. "I can't do this, Mouri. I have to go. I can't watch him do this without losing my mind."

The conversation fades into Mouri Ran trying to calm Kuroba Kaito down as he takes harsh breaths, interspersed with the sharp sounds of a choked-down sob.

"It's going to be all right, Kuroba-kun," Mouri Ran murmurs, and Kuroba Kaito makes another strangled sound.

It is too much. Stumbling away from the door, he reaches up to find his cheeks wet with inexplicable tears. They glisten on his violinist's fingertips as he collapses on the bed.

In that moment, he decides he cannot stand for this. Kuroba Kaito is right. He cannot remember what he feels, and in doing so, he is causing suffering. He does not remember who Kuroba Kaito is to him, but he does know, more than anything else, that he does not want to see Kuroba Kaito broken.

He will leave in the morning.

* * *

Shinichi wakes up.

He rubs his eyes, yawning sleepily, before he actually bothers to lift his head off the pillow and struggle into a sitting position. Looking around, it seems he's in the professor's house, on the spare bed parked just outside the kitchen. What time is it, he wonders?

A thought prods at the back of his mind, but Shinichi steadfastly ignores it in favor of frowning to himself. The last week or so is a haze – he knows he must've gotten his body back, judging from the fact that, well, he has his body back, and he can kind of remember going to a few places with Ran and Hattori and Haibara, but that's about it. Oh, and Kaito getting embarrassingly emotional about something-or-other. He grins. He's going to hold that over his head for a long, long time.

That train of thought is derailed when a door opens somewhere down the hall and, wow, speak of the devil, Kaito staggers out. Shinichi takes a moment to absorb in the sight of an adorable, sleepy Kaito in wrinkled clothing, because God knows he's usually all composed and smirky and whatnot, before he calls out, "Good morning."

Kaito actually _flinches_ – which draws an alarmed frown out of Shinichi, because Kaito _never_ flinches unless there's fish or Aoko's mop involved – and turns slowly to look at him. Shinichi is terrified at the worn look on his face. Something is definitely not right.

"Good morning, Shinichi," Kaito mumbles, not quite meeting his eyes, and okay, Shinichi has had enough.

"What is _wrong_ with you?" he demands, eyebrows lifted, and Kaito doesn't even get defensive. He just looks enough more tired.

"The irony is that there's nothing wrong with me and everything wrong with you," he answers without energy.

"Oh my God." Shinichi gapes. "Okay, seriously, _what_ is wrong with you?"

Kaito looks at him, really looks at him, for the first time. His eyes widen. "Wait a minute, Shinichi, are you…?"

"Am I what?" Shinichi grins at him, relieved at the first sign of life. "The best detective ever and your favorite critic? Because yes, I am."

He's not expecting what happens next, which is that Kaito's face crumbles and he launches himself at Shinichi, practically sobbing, and kisses every inch of Shinichi he can reach.

"Um," Shinichi gets out several minutes later, breathing a little hard as Kaito clutches relentlessly at his shirt, "as much as I'm – ah – enjoying this, can I get an explanation?"

Pulling back, Kaito swallows hard. He's almost crying, to Shinichi's bewildered concern. "You had amnesia," he explains, and _oh_ , right. That happened. Slowly but surely, memories from the last week start to repopulate the far reaches of Shinichi's mind. Tropical Land, and the okonomiyaki restaurant, and the library -

Sniffling, Kaito goes on, "You forgot _everything_. And it was because of _me_ , because we got in that stupid fight and –"

"For the love of – just shut up." Shinichi kisses the corner of Kaito's mouth and smirks at the flush that suddenly colors his neck. He adjusts the splay of Kaito's legs over his. "It's not your fault. It's –" He almost says _my fault,_ but he can tell from the subtle change in Kaito's expression that it would be a monumentally bad idea, so he clears his throat. "It's no one's fault. And it turned out, uh, fine."

He knows he's said the wrong thing when Kaito glares.

"You put me through a week of hell, Shinichi," he snaps, swatting at Shinichi's shoulder. "You literally only remembered stuff you did with me. But not –"

"How I felt about you, right?" Shinichi finishes, and at Kaito's inquisitive lift of an eyebrow, he just beams. "I overheard your conversation with Ran, you know."

"Oh." Kaito looks away. "Not one of my, ah, proudest moments, but…"

Shinichi shushes him with a low hum. "No, it was actually what made me decide that I needed to remember, or I'd just keep hurting you. Even without remembering you, I knew I didn't want to see you hurt, so." His admission makes him duck his head, especially when Kaito grins stupidly at him.

"What a romantic, tantei-kun," he sings, and Shinichi steadfastly does _not_ blush as he readjusts his hold on Kaito's arms and looks up into Kaito's eyes.

"Oh," he suddenly remarks, and Kaito slants his head at him.

"What?"

Shinichi shakes his head. "It's nothing."

Kaito's eyes are _indigo_.

* * *

 **Yeeeah, well. In the beginning, I was planning on having Shinichi never fully regain his memory and just fall in love with Kaito all over again, but I got lazy.**

 **Uh, anyway, hope you enjoyed this fic (if you did, please consider leaving me a review!) and I'll see you all soon! Oh, and hypothetical question - how do you guys feel about a spy AU? - Luna**


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